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How much of this chapter-and Part regarding Manafort is needed is debatable
As big a day as today was in Michael Cohen news, Manafort got some news of his own-which he could surely have done without. The Trump defenders always claim that Mueller’s investigation of Manafort is unrelated to the 2016 campaign.
FN: The idea that Manafort had no relation to Russian Collusion seems pretty quaint in retrospect with all the public information we now have-see Chapter A.
New charges filed against Manafort last night make it clear this is NOT the case:
“Search warrant documents used by special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators reveal how agents zeroed in on potential criminal activity related to Paul Manafort’s time as Donald Trump’s campaign chairman.”
“The documents, used to obtain a search warrant in building the case against Manafort, were revealed in a court filing late Monday night. Manafort has pleaded not guilty in two federal cases, and the charges he faces do not include allegations about his time on the campaign.”
“The search warrant makes clear, however, that Mueller is also focused on Manafort’s actions connected to the campaign. The White House and others have repeatedly said that the investigation into Manafort concerns only his activities before he joined Trump’s team in 2016.”
“Investigators in a search warrant application last July told a judge in Virginia that they sought evidence related to Manafort’s interactions with a Russian real estate magnate and were suspicious of possible campaign finance violations.”
“Mueller’s team sought records in Manafort’s apartment related to his attendance at the Trump Tower Russia meeting in June, 2016.”
Specifically, the investigators sought from Manafort’s apartment records “involving any of the attendees of the June 9, 2016, meeting at Trump Tower” and anything involving Aras and Emin Agalarov, an Azerbaijani-Russian billionaire and his son tied to the meeting, the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow and to a possible earlier unsuccessful attempt to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.”
This is in line with reports last week that Mueller got clearance from Mueller not just to investigate payments Manafort received from Ukrainian politicians but wether Manafort ‘colluded with the Russian government’ to interfere in the 2016 election.
Mueller is also looking at wether Manafort took in foreign donations from wealthy Russians-which are illegal.
“An FBI agent’s affidavit included in the paperwork also describes how investigators had probable cause to search for evidence related to several crimes with which Manafort was eventually charged, like foreign lobbying, tax and banking violations.”
“Yet there’s one possible crime listed on the affidavit he hasn’t been charged with, and that could point to the core of the current probe: violations of the foreign contribution ban. That law bars foreign nationals from donating “directly or indirectly” to US elections, campaigns and political parties and also prohibits people in the US from receiving those contributions. CNN reported last week that Mueller’s investigators have looked into the possibility that wealthy Russians funneled money into the presidential election.”
Interestingly more light on the FBI’s raid of Manafort’s home last July came out hours after the news hit of the raid on Michael Cohen’s home.
In still more Manafort news, another associate of his has flipped on him, leading the FBI to a storage locker full of his financial papers:
F”ormer Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort has trouble in his own house. According to court documents, one of Manafort’s former employees led an FBI agent to a storage locker filled with paperwork on Manafort’s businesses and finances. The person’s name is redacted from the filings. But he’s now at the center of a fight over evidence that could play a significant role in the government’s case against Manafort.”
“People do strange things when confronted with authoritative FBI agents,” said Sol Wisenberg, a criminal defense attorney with Nelson Mullins.
So another Manafort associate flips on him-as Rick Gates and Van der Zwan did in February.
“Manafort’s attorneys revealed the information about the second former employee in an April 6, 2018, court filing. In the filing, Manafort’s attorneys asked the federal judge overseeing the prosecution to block documents found in a storage unit in Alexandria, Virginia, from being used as evidence against him. They argue the employee did not have the authority to let the FBI agent look into the storage unit, and that, therefore, the FBI violated Manafort’s Fourth Amendment rights.”
“Manafort’s filing includes a heavily redacted affidavit signed by an FBI special agent on May 27, 2017. In that affidavit, the FBI agent explains how he learned about a storage unit full of documents from Manafort.”
“The agent describes meeting with “a former employee of Davis Manafort Partners, and a current employee of Steam Mountain, LLC, which is a business currently operated by Paul Manafort.” The employee, whose name is redacted throughout the affidavit, told the FBI agent that he “performs a variety of functions for Manafort and his companies as directed by Manafort,” and was salaried.
These documents kind of sound important:
“The FBI agent then looked into the storage unit and saw about 21 boxes of documents, as well as a filing cabinet. One box was marked as containing expenses, paid bills, invoices, and legal complaints. Another box said it contained “Ukraine Binders,” as well information about ballot security, Georgia, research, and “Ukraine Campaign.”
Ukraine campaign-that could make for some rather interesting reading.
“The FBI agent seemed to figure out immediately that the storage unit’s contents were interesting, because the law enforcement officials started surveilling the storage unit facility to see if anyone went in to take out any files. The day after seeing the storage unit, the FBI agent filed the affidavit—which was more than 20 pages long—with a magistrate judge.”
The Manafort team’s response was the old ‘low level employee’ excuse:
Manafort’s lawyers are arguing that the former employee didn’t have the authority to let the FBI agent look inside the storage unit. The lawyers describe the one-time employee as “low-level” and responsible for “administrative functions.” They argue that the FBI agent violated Manafort’s Fourth Amendment rights by looking into the storage unit, and that the former employee didn’t have the lawful authority to let the FBI agent look into the storage unit.
That’s what Trump calls Manafort’s work for his 2016 campaign-‘he was a low level employee who worked here a few days.’